A Physical Simulator Integrated with Soft Sensing for Mastering the Manipulation of Vascular Structures in Robotic Surgery

EasyChair Preprint 8181

Abstract

Robot-assisted minimally invasive surgery requires the surgeons to learn the new control dynamics of the surgical instruments and, usually, how to deal with the loss of haptic feedback. Indeed, excessive forces applied to delicate tissues as blood vessels may cause dramatic intraoperative events, such as major bleeding. Training plays a paramount role to prevent the onset of such adverse events. This work focuses on the development of an anatomy-based physical simulator of pulmonary vein for mastering tissue manipulation while using a surgical robot. The silicone-based simulator was integrated with soft strain sensors. Sensor data were characterized and used for objective skill assessment and for giving a visuo-acoustic feedback to the trainee. Preliminary user studies were carried out using the da Vinci surgical system, which lacks haptic feedback. These tests allowed us to assess the construct validity of the simulator.

Keyphrases: Simulators, Soft Sensors, Telerobotics and Teleoperation, Training and skill assessment

@booklet{EasyChair:8181,
  author    = {Andrea Mariani and Dario Galeazzi and Selene Tognarelli and Arianna Menciassi},
  title     = {A Physical Simulator Integrated with Soft Sensing for Mastering the Manipulation of Vascular Structures in Robotic Surgery},
  howpublished = {EasyChair Preprint 8181},
  year      = {EasyChair, 2022}}